Abdominal obesity and pulmonary functions in young Indian adults: a prospective study

Obesity is a global health hazard and has been linked to numerous metabolic complications such as dyslipidemia, type II diabetes, & cardio vascular diseases and is negatively associated to the pulmonary function. The mechanism for this association is still debated and the best marker of adiposity in relation to dynamic pulmonary function is still not clear. We assessed the association of respiratory parameters and body mass index (BMI), waist circumference (WC) and Waist Hip ratio (WHR) as the markers of relative and abdominal obesity adiposity respectively. Step wise linear regression analysis was used to find out the association of FVC and FEV1 (performed in standing) with over all and adiposity markers stratified by gender and adjusted to height and age. A random sample of volunteers (n=80) from general population in and around Dehradun, India of age group 20-40 years. In women the WC shows a higher negative association to respiratory parameters FVC and FEV1 {B (P value), R2 as - 0.381(0.017), 0.122 and - 0.373(0.019), 0.139} while all the adiposity markers showed a negative significant association. In men WC showed highly significant negative association with FVC and FEV1 {Beta (P value), R2 as - 0.502(0.001), 0.232 and - 0.428(0.006), 0.184} with higher R2 values as compared to other adiposity parameters. The result suggested that the abdominal obesity marker is an important and better predictor of pulmonary function than BMI and the investigators suggest the inclusion of it as a potential confounding factor when investigating the determinants of pulmonary function.